Just in the Nick of Time

Tomorrow is my AQWS class - and I finished up my class sample just in time.. This month we are working on Art Quilts inspired by Jeanne Williamson's "The UnCommon Quilter". She is wonderfully creative in using common elements in her art quilts...

My UnCommon object was netting and onion bags - and I decided on a "LEAF" theme. My sample is actually 3 mini quilts - approximately 12 x12 - which i made into a book...

Here are the pic's:

Page one - also the cover - features Ivy felt leaves, thread painted in place and onion bag background - closeup detail below:

page two (above)- is a grid designed to showcase a collection of leaf embellishments - the background has netting, with the same plastic canvas yarn couched with a zig zag stitch. Before the yarn was couched - I thread painted an allover leaf design to secure the netting to the fabric background. Close-up detail below...

Page three is another version of felted leaves. I used a leaf from the magnolia tree in my yard as a pattern - then I fused the dark green dot fabric to some green craft felt. I used a freezer paper pattern to layout the leaves on the fused fabric and machine stitched around them - then cut them out and thread painted them to the background - the dividers are stretched and rolled onion bag strips. Closeup detail picture below:

Hindsight n Other details...

I used a fused binding technique I picked up from Laura Wasilowski who spoke last week at the Quilters Guild of Plano. I found this to be a wonderful finish to the pages of my book...

I love page one - the felted leaves were easy and fun. I love the contrast of textures between the onion bag, plastic canvas yarn and the felt..

Page 2 was a challenge - I love the idea of the grid to showcase my leaf embellishments - it reminds me of a shadowbox somewhat... Originally I had all the little leaves laid out in lines of 3's within each section - it looked to restricted and un-natural - so I decided to let the leaves blow in the breeze somewhat for a more natural look.. This is just OK to me -but ok enough to leave as is.

Page 3 I love the technique of fusing the commercial cotton to the felt - it gives great dimension and texture to the leaves - I see lots of possibilities with this idea and will experiment further with it...The dividers on the page are weak but do showcase the leaves nicely. I would have preferred to use the onion bag as a background similar to page one - but since this is an experiment - it's OK too.

The book binding - is commercial cotton fused to felt and stitched in place to secure - this worked wonderfully. my only regret is that I did not rotate my design so the book binding was at the top of the page rather than the traditional side. More experiments on my fabric art books to come as well...